Justin Gimelstob is soon going to run out of fingers, the way he’s sticking one into every tennis pie.
The latest area of the game to get the benefit of the American former player’s involvement is the coaching side, as top-ranked American John Isner has announced that Gimelstob has signed on as his full-time coach for 2015.
I’m excited 2 be coaching @JohnIsner. He is a unique talent, I look forward 2 helping him maximize his vast potential pic.twitter.com/3IU3MKUqtt
— Justin Gimelstob (@justingimelstob) December 10, 2014
Isner: ‘I had a great run with Mike Sell, learned a lot from him. Time 2 try something new, and with Justin passionate new voice on my team’ — Matt Cronin (@TennisReporters) December 10, 2014
It’s the latest line on Gimelstob’s extensive tennis resumé, which is laid out here on his website.
Which, notably, doesn’t include any actual coaching experience.
In a nutshell:
1) He’s on the ATP Tour board of directors as a “player representative” and is the Chairman of Player Business. He “has been one of the most successful advocates for player’s rights since the Tour’s inception.” That’s saying something.
2) He’s a worldwide ambassador for SAP, Babolat, Nike, and Zico Coconut water.
3) Justin Gimelstob Children’s Fund has donated over 1 million dollars to The Valerie Fund, an organization that supports children with cancer and other blood disorders.
4) He has worked with Tennis Channel, CBS, NBC, Fox Sports, Fox Sports Radio, ESPN, The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, CNN, TV Guide and Extra. The CBC apparently doesn’t make the cut, but he has done work for them as well during the Rogers Cup (and did a good job, too).
5) He has a production company, “Without Limits Productions” and hosts and co-produces ATP World Tour Uncovered, his own interview show called “Holding Court With Justin Gimelstob”, and other programming.
6) He has over 38,000 Twitter followers, and his account is a treasure trove of pics of Justin with anyone you’ve ever heard of.
7) He’ll play some legends doubles at the Delray Beach event in March.
Last but not least, he’s a new husband and a new father; Brandon Graves Gimelstob was born in Sept. 2013.
The only thing he hasn’t yet seem to have done is get into the player agent business.
But the year isn’t over yet.
It would probably make a pretty good story to track how Gimelstob, a decent but hardly standout player during his career, managed to insinuate himself in so many areas of the tennis universe. It’s impressive, because there are a lot of folks out there who have less-than-glowing things to say about him.
But he strikes you as the type who doesn’t give a fig what people think. He just jumps right into everything with what appears to be a tremendous amount of self-confidence and self-belief.
He also seems to always have people at the ready with his cellphone camera, and regularly culls his TV appearances for good Instagram shots with just about everyone in tennis.
To wit (a small sample from Gimelstob’s Instagram feed):
[slideshow_deploy id=’17218’]
To be fair, he has exponentially more adorable photos of his son on there than he does tennis people.
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